Exploring The Pokopia Bubbly Basin Dream Island

You may have just gotten to Bubbly Basin in Pokémon Pokopia, but it’s already time to take off again, because a new dream island awaits. The Pokopia Expansion Pass’s first wave comes with a brand new doll and partially submerged Dream Island to plunder — er, explore — and it’s filled with an impressive amount of structures and spaces to visit and treasure to dig up. 

Here’s everything you need to know about the Bubbly Basin Dream Island, from how to pick up the new doll to what exactly you can find when Drifloon drops you off at this new destination. Minor spoilers ahead!

How to Get the Starmie Doll

You’ll have to get a bit into Bubbly Basin’s questline before you can actually get the new doll, which is modeled after a Starmie. After raising the environment level to three, Popplio will ask you to build a special structure and requests that you find some of its friends to help the cause. Popplio will give you the general locations of these friends as well as some vague name hints. 

The friend Popplio calls “the floating pink one” refers to a Frillish (female) and it’s Frillish that will help you find the Starmie doll. You can find Frillish in a nearby cave, which it asks you to explore with it and hunt down a Starmie doll. You’ll have to use Frillish’s Search specialty and the dowsing machine to track the doll down. Frillish will lead you to a few other items before you eventually find the Starmie doll hidden under a pile of star-spotted rocks.

From there, the doll is yours to use. You do not have to surface to use the doll — Drifloon will come to you underwater. 

Bubbly Basin Dream Island Materials

Once you summon Drifloon and it whisks you away to the new dream island, simply called Basin Dream Island, there will be a lot to explore, find, and collect. And you’ll get to do it all while an absolutely delightful tropical beat plays in the background.

You arrive at the typical dock found in all Pokémon Pokopia dream islands, sitting above water. However, there isn't really much of an island to be found. Most of the dream island is underwater, with the exception of a few scattered islands and when the unique structures rise out of the water. The island’s above-water grass is the same as Bleak Beach’s.

The Basin Dream Island’s “Things to Find” list (the one that pops up when you ask Drifloon to take you) includes Sea grapes, Small coral, and Grubby pearls. It certainly has a plethora of those — it feels like a jewelry store with the amount of pearls you can find — but there’s a lot more to find as well. 

All of the coral types, lush seaweed, sea moss, stardust, sea glass fragments, seashells, seabed flowers in multiple colors, and sometimes watermelons, not to mention the standards like sturdy sticks and stones. The Basin Dream Island also features Iron and gold ore and appears to have a higher than normal chance of specialty rocks like the heat rock or the icy rock spawning (I’ve found three in two trips). 

Basin Dream Island Structures

Like other Pokémon Pokopia dream islands, the Basin Dream Island has a few signature structures. These include a tower with a spiraling staircase that often holds some of the marine furniture pieces, a ruined lab with lots of metal blocks and a garden of watermelons, and a daycare building with playground equipment (that happens to be constructed with more than two dozen solid gold blocks!). You can find all three of the above structures on one dream island. 

There is also an underwater version of the typical golden Poké Ball pedestal complete with the twisty pillar objects and stately flooring blocks (both new with the Expansion Pass). 

Poké Balls and Human Records

Bubbly Basin’s Dream Island appears to be chalk-full of Poké Balls (I picked up seven gold and nine red, though it’s certainly possible that the numbers will dwindle the more times you visit as there will be less to find). 

In addition, you can find brand new Bubbly Basin-exclusive human records as well as base game human records. Some of the expansion pass-exclusive records will give you new wearables. For example, you can grab the New Product Announcement Newspaper, which will give you the side tails hairstyle.

New Recruitable Mythical Pokémon

The new Dream Island isn't just for treasure hunting. You can make a new friend too! Phione (who has murky, unofficial ties to Pokopia's other new mythical, Manaphy) can appear on Basin Dream Islands. Check out caves for a structure made of pink and white blocks, inside of which you'll find the new mythical. A little cutscene will play upon entering. After, you can can talk to Phione and invite them to live in your world.

Basin Dream Island Exploration Tips

No matter what Pokémon Pokopia dream island you’re heading to, you should always bring as many open pocket spaces as possible. That’s especially true for the Basin Dream Island because there is just so much to pick up. It would also be wise to bring a few hamburger steaks so you can mine the ore and destroy blocks faster as Graveler. Keep in mind that, thanks to the new update, you can suck up blocks as Graveler (you no longer have to switch back to human Ditto form). 

Finally, if you think you’ve found everything on the island, check again. Sometimes Poké Balls blend in with the coral and other colorful things that cover the sea floor.

So, are you ready to let Drifloon drag you off to a new Dream Island? Wave 1 of the Pokopia Expansion Pass is out now, and more guides will be coming your way so stay tuned!